Gong Xi Fa Cai, IP and Upcoming Events

As they say, better late than never. The unusual delay in posting this piece is attributable to my ill – health stemming from extensive travel while I was at my home turf and landing amidst Snowzilla ( I was in India for almost three weeks in January after more than a year).

Hence, could there be a better timing than the commencement of the Year of the Monkey to syncopate this deafening silence on my part. Little did I know that my inability to wish the readers a Happy New Year as per the Gregorian calendar was paving the path for me to wish all of you Gong Xi Fa Cai! May the Monkey be an epitome of vitality, prosperity and success for all.

On this occasion, I also want to thank each one of you for your unflinching support to my blogging endeavour. A special thanks to my Philadelphian cousin Terence Tuhinanshu, who not only inspired me to blog but being the dreamer – writer sorts also took upon himself to review my writing ( To know what does it mean to write like a dream, visit his blog).

I’m also grateful to Dr. Amal Punchihewa for his timely encouragement and words of advise, Pratik Sanwaria for giving suggestions on topics to cover, Mario Zuniga, Andras Jokuti and friends back in India for their valuable inputs on improving the blog. Last but not the least my parents who have always held a steadfast belief in my goals.

On the first day of the Chinese Lunar Calendar, I also make a solemn New Year resolution of writing atleast three quality posts every month. While I would ideally want to stick to my previous promise of weekly posts, with a deluge of professional and scholarly commitments, it seems far fetched.

Today, I shall not delve into anything elaborate. For the benefit of readers, I want to highlight two upcoming events which have caught my fancy –

The Cato Institute’s Center for Constitutional Studies and the Federalist Society for Law & Public Policy Studies is organising a panel discussion on how libertarians and conservatives conceive intellectual property. The panel discussion seeks to delve into the question,whether intellectual property was akin to really property in the sense of conferring a natural right upon the owner or was it a government conferred monopoly impeding innovation.

The discussion will be held at Hayek Auditorium on February 10th, 2016 from 11.00 A.M. to 1.00 P.M. Prior registration to the event is imperative. For those who can’t attend, the event will be live webcast.

By now, many of you may be aware of my keen interest in this topic, which essentially goes to the jurisprudential roots of IP protection. I see this topic as an extension of the conversation which took place in one of the panel discussion’s organised by the R Street Institute and Reason in October last year. For an extensive coverage on that discussion, see my post here.

Given my keen interest in the topic (to the extent that I’ve been researching independently on the topic and deliberating upon writing a paper on it), I’ll be attending the event and doing an extensive commentary and coverage on it. Watch out for the next post on my views on the discussion.

The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is organizing an International Conference on Intellectual Property and Development on April 7 and April 8, 2016 in Geneva. Prior registration for the Conference is imperative. For those who can’t attend ( I’m on the list. I will not possibly travel to Geneva to attend one Conference even though the topic is of immense interest to me!) , the conference will be live webcast from April 7, 9 : 00 a.m. Geneva time ( Unfortunately, the link to the live webcast is not yet available. I’ll post it as soon as I find about it).

The Conference seeks to delve into the seemingly debatable issue of role of IP in development. What strikes me most about this Conference is it’s wide range of discourse on the influence of IP on development. Traditionally, I’ve mostly attended or have read about the role of IP in social and economic development (most of the panel discussions that I’ve attended in Washington D.C. revolve on the interplay of IP with economic development). Hence, it’ll be interesting to hear about the role of IP in cultural development.

The agenda for the Conference also states some interesting case studies that will be presented to demonstrate the role of IP on the three facets of development, ” economic, social and cultural.” Given my interest in Traditional Knowledge (TK) and Traditional Cultural Expressions (TCE), I’m particularly keen to hear about the ” From the heart – Moldovan brands” , ” Jamaican jerk seasoning” and the ” Amouage luxury perfumes” case studies. I want to be able to gauge their interrelationship (if any) to TK and TCE.

Needless to say, I’ll be watching the entire live webcast and doing an extensive coverage and commentary on the same.

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